An open question.....When tying zebra midges, do you typically tie with or without beads? I see them in the fly shops both ways. Sometimes I tie some crystal flash as a little wing off the top. Is there a right way and a wronge way, or are they called different things.

When I tie the zebra midge pattern, I will definitely tie 3 types primarily. Those without the kf top and wing, those with, and then I will tie some with the clear glass bead. Size 18 and smaller. There was a time when I wouldn't have believed that a size 22 or 24 zebra with or without that kf wing would make a difference, until one day I was floating with a well known guide and I happened to have the midge with the wing on and the guy floating with me didn't. It just happened the trout were keying in to the midge emergers with the kf wing and I hooked up with a half dozen before he figured out what the difference was and changed. Immediately he started getting hookups.

Lesson learned, have some of each type in your box, as well as tying them in different colors. This is easily one of my favorites on the SJ. RS2 being second.

I agree w/ FishnPreach that they are 2 different flies. They imitate 2 different parts of the midge's lifecylce: pupa stage (no flash) and emerger stage (flash).

In terms of beads, I generally stay away from using beads on the Juan, even though I've had success on other rivers using midge imitations w/ beads. There is one exception, however: I have had sucess in the past with tying a "gun metal" bead on a size 24 black zebra midge.

_________________Ryno

Last edited by Ryno on Thu Aug 21, 2008 4:30 pm; edited 1 time in total

The glass bead midge is definitely not my first choice. Considering the fact that the glass bead is there to only imitate the gas bubbles which form to help the midge rise the surface it is as far as I am aware impossible to determine if and when that might be occurring.

Thank you all for the responces. sometimes I get ahead of myself and start imitating fly's I see in fly shops rather than imitating Fly's from the river. From your comments I realized what I was doing and am changing my evil ways. I think the pressure of my first bi-fly tourney had my head spinning. It was very satisfying to catch fish on my own fly's when people were having little luck around me.

I tend to be a bit of a maverick when it comes to tying for the SJ it comes with the years of fishing the river. Because of my breach of using standard SJ patterns I have arrived at my personal collection of patterns which frees me from carrying scads of boxes with scads of patterns. I usually wear a guide shirt with two fly patches and two very small streamworks boxes in my pockets. I have yet to run into a situation that I was not prepared for. This works on the Green as well as other western tail waters. The secret is that I have learned to personalize and style my fly patterns. midgeaholic

Different times, different patterns. There have been times when all they would eat was the bead wing midge. At other, they like the KF.

Come prepared. Unless you have somebody reliable to key you in on the good combos, just mix and match until you find the right combo. The first day is usually trial and error, but you figure it out. The second day you nail it.

Yes Ken, I carry a small scooping net(the kind you find at the pet shop) that attaches to my wading staff. Like I wrote in my post I have been working at carrying as little as possible but, I find that netting is essential in finding out what is below the surface film. I also have one small specimen bottle. Tightlines midgeaholic.

I agree with you about stomach pumps, but I guess those who like them will argue that by examining the contents of a fish's stomach you know for sure what it's been eating, whereas seining for bugs doesn't really tell you if the trout are eating that particular bug. However, I'd say that first you'd have to catch the fish before you could examine its stomach contents, and if I was already catching fish, I'd know what they were eating anyway. I know a pretty good guide on the SJ who uses stomach pumps; he says if used properly (i.e., use the pump to gently flush water down the fish's throat into the stomach to flush out some of what it's been eating) it shouldn't hurt the fish, but I wonder how many regular fly-fishers actually know how to properly use it.

Anyway, your suggestion of a paint strainer is a good one; wish I'd thought of it before I bought a Wind River Quick Seine to stretch over my net.